Evaporated
by Ms. Tamara Who
Summary: After the abrupt and mysterious death of The Boy Who Lived, all of the wizarding world wants to know the truth. But only one man holds the answers: Draco Malfoy. '"I could have been happy," it read.' AU, disregards the last few books. Implied HP/DM.


Under the circumstances, Draco thought he was holding up rather well. Honestly, he was a man with a method, and when that method was poked or prodded in any way, one might say he tended to make the rest of the world cower in fear to compensate.

"Oi! Ratface! I'm not through with you just yet!"

Well, there always had to be a bloody exception.

"What is it, Weaselette? Perhaps a piece of dinnerware in my flat you forgot to throw at me?"

He stopped a moment, mentally, to think of what he could have said-- what he didn't say. 'I'm surprised you threw that fork at me-- I'm sure such a finely-crafted utensil is worth more than your whole house.' Or perhaps, 'Thought he was under the Confundus, eh? He'd need more than an Imperius Curse to even _look_ at you the way he looked at me.' Something sharp-edged and scathing to roll off his pureblooded tongue like water.

So what stopped him?

This was where things got sticky. Draco wasn't one for sentiment- the mushy 'forever and always' you get from reading trashy novels- nor did he think his personality had somehow been altered or, god forbid, influenced by 'that sort' of observations and experiences. No, he had enough sense to know that he was who he was, that things would never have changed; he hadn't ever had the courage for _that_ sort of confrontation- one he'd imagined with increasing fervor each day he attended Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Now that he'd seen it play out in his head a billion times over, he knew he never could have done it. His blood-- his method-- simply wouldn't allow it. It was odd enough now that _she was here._

Why _was_ she here?

It was only then, taking in her tensed shoulders and whitened knuckles, that he realized it was the only thing she could do. Her lovely little white-fence life had crumbled-- no-- had been whipped out from underneath her like a goddamn rug, and she was terrified. Ginny Weasley, however, could never admit to anyone, herself included, that she was afraid. This was what she did; her world was threatened, she couldn't save it, so she wanted revenge or solace or _something_. And all Draco had to give her was the diary. His diary. _The_ diary. The one every breathing magical being was dying to find, all with the same stupid questions that Skeeter woman had asked him ages ago. His parents-- had he missed them? Was he in love? Did he support the Ministry?

Draco had only one question, and one alone: Did he know the clock had finally run out?

He'd spent hours staring at it-- over tea, over coffee, over rolls and kidney pudding-- and it still gave him a jolt to see it written there, bright as the bloody day.

_I could have been happy,_ it read.

And there was a date on all of the pages. Not the date it had been on the day it was written- this date had been two full weeks after any of the entries: October 31.

He had known.

Whether he had had a dream about it, or a fit, or just a 'feeling,' he had known he was marching into a battle he would not return from...

Draco picked at a loose thread on his sleeve. The Weaselette was drinking it all in, trying to rearange the scene before her to something appropriate-- something expected-- where the tide would turn her way and Draco would come to believe that her need for answers was greater than his need for privacy. The stupid twat. She had known him far too long to still have such hopes.

"What made you decide _you're_ the only one entitled to answers? I was his friend for years. _I_ wasn't the one trying to blast him apart in some darkened corridor when his back was turned."

Draco had to admit there was a small bit of sound logic to that. A very small bit. He had had the awful feeling when she'd first stumbled in that he was going to cave-- to whatever it was she wanted. Something about the slackness of her jaw, the way her eyes burned and flashed but never actually blazed as they used to. Something about those sputtering eyes reminded him of someone else, someone he used to know.

"Alright, alright," he snapped, running a hand through his hair, "You do have a bit of a point there."

Bitten down was the 'I-think-you-know-exactly-why' and the 'don't-even-pretend-you're-not-jealous-you-chit' that would have usually followed, and this time Draco didn't have to ask himself why. He knew he stopped himself from lashing out, from snatching back the last bit of light from her eyes, for the same reason he was planning on telling her what she had come to hear-- every last thing. And god, if he wasn't making himself sick over it.

"Well," she said.

Just 'well.' After all that, 'well' was all she had for him. Which was just as well, because he could tell it was going to be a long night, full of awkward pauses and teary sniffs and sentiment by the truckload. For 'him', he reminded himself, and that made it all easier. For someone he would only ever see now in the faint shadow of the hallway, in the softly drifting snow, in a wrinkle on his bedsheet. That was enough. That was all he needed to see, and more than he'd ever seen, in a sense.

"Well," he echoed dully, "Just well?"

She nodded.

"Well let's sit down, shall we? What is it you want to know?"

For a moment he thought she wasn't going to answer-- which would have been not only a criminally tasteless waste of a dish-smashing frenzy, but also pretty Weasley of her. But luckily she unhinged her mouth a little, and said quietly, "I want to know... everything, I want to hear it all. Why he stopped talking to us-- shutting us out. What he was thinking before... you know, how much did he know, expect to happen? And why... what happened between you two. I think I want to know that most of all-- why a boy who was his enemy for six years, maybe his whole life, suddenly decided he deserved to be his friend. What made you think you were so special. I'm curious, really-- enlighten me. Please."

Draco sucked in a breath, slowly, trying to still the slight tremors that had begun deep in the pit of his stomach. He knew he would tell it all, not because she wanted to know, but because it's what 'he' would have wanted. 'He' wouldn't want his friend in the dark, that's how 'he' was-- a fan of closure, of visiting gravesites and lighting candles for each quiet death as they came. And if Draco couldn't make things right again, he could at least honor what he supposed were his wishes, if only to feel as though a very small part of him had never truly gone.

So quietly, carefully, he folded his hands in his lap, and began.


End file.
